The Congressional caucus representing Asian Pacific Americans and Asian American advocacy groups found themselves in the unusual position Tuesday of complaining that a new Pew Research Center survey, “The Rise of Asian Americans,” portrays their community too well.

“The Pew study, which has received wide media attention, could lead some to draw conclusions that reflect inaccurate stereotypes about Asian Americans being a community with high levels of achievement and few challenges,” the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans said in a statement.

“[W]e must also avoid drawing oversimplified conclusions that ignore the many real challenges facing our diverse population,” said Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.), chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus.

The NCAPA worries that the survey’s statistics could overshadow the problems facing the community.

“We don’t want our community to be painted with a broad brush,” NCAPA chair Deepa Iyer told POLITICO. “The way that the study is framed, we’re concerned that people might draw conclusions that the Asian American community overall is high achieving, and doesn’t have any problems.… The language they’ve used about the community highlights the exceptionalism of the community and doesn’t go into the challenges and disparities of our communities.”

The Pew Research Center countered that it made extensive efforts to catalog the Asian American population, with a nationally representative sample of Asian Americans with respondents from more than 20 specific subgroups.

“The full report — all 200 plus pages — is suffused with details that explore the great diversity of attitudes and experiences, both positive and negative, within the community,” Pew spokesperson Vidya Krishnamurthy said.

In general, the Pew survey portrays the Asian American community positively, finding that Asian Americans have higher than average levels of college education; lower poverty rates than the general population; and relatively low self-reported racial discrimination.

But that doesn’t mean Iyer’s advocacy organization is out of reasons to advocate.

“Asian communities have been seen as model minorities, but what happens is that policy-makers and stakeholders tend to ignore our community when it comes to policy changes. Where there might be disparities — if people are not aware that there are pockets of Asian Americans that are experiencing disparities — they’re not going to be able to get access to resources… that they deserve,” said Iyer.

“I would strongly caution against using this data to validate the ‘model minority’ myth. Our community is one of stark contrasts, with significant disparities within and between various subgroups. The ‘Asian Pacific American’ umbrella includes over 45 distinct ethnicities speaking over 100 language dialects, and many of the groups that were excluded from this report are also the ones with the greatest needs,” added Chu.

The Pew Research Center argued Tuesday that the numbers speak for themselves, and that the report contained both good and bad news for the Asian American community.

“Anyone who wonders whether the report provides good news or bad news should read the full 200 plus pages of empirical data. The numbers speak for themselves,” said Krishnamurthy.

Iyer pointed to a figure about Asians Americans and racial discrimination as an example. According to the study, only 13 percent of Asian Americans say that discrimination is a “major problem for them.”

“There are patterns of discrimination that have been affecting community members that are ongoing currently,” Iyer said.

Meanwhile, groups advocating for Asian American students and research in education found the Pew survey “disparaging,” even accusing the organization of suppressing poverty rates.

“Failure to explore the higher education experiences of Southeast Asians, omission of data on Pacific Islander students, suppression of poverty rates, and dismissal of un-satisfaction levels” was cited by the Asian & Pacific Islander American Scholarship Fund (APIASF) and the National Commission on Asian American and Pacific Islander Research in Education (CARE) as reasons for offense.